The Masquers

by Natasha Peters

  “I am noble, too, or have you forgotten?” she said coldly. “Will I vanish, too?”

  He gave an exasperated sigh and pulled her into a tight embrace. “Yes, Lady, you will vanish right into my arms. We’ll never be apart again after this is all over, I swear it. I’ll be as loving and as faithful as a hound. Maybe I’ll even learn how to pay pretty compliments.” He grinned. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Raf Leopardi playing the cicisbeo?” her body felt stiff and unyielding in his arms. When he tried to kiss her, she turned her face away.

  “No, please, I don’t want to.”

  “Yes, you do. You’ve wanted to ever since you came into this room. You just had to get a few details out of the way first, like telling me what you think of me.

  She said faintly, “I’m not finished yet.”

  “Yes, you are,” he said, holding her so tightly that she couldn’t breathe and kissing her until she felt faint. She gave a little sigh and sagged against him. “That’s better. Come on, woman. I’ve waited seven years and I’m not going to wait anymore.”

  He took her to his bed. He pushed her skirts aside, unfastened his breeches, and plunged into her without any preliminaries. She felt herself plummeting backwards into the welcoming warmth of old familiar delights. Jolts of pleasure shot through her, and as he gripped her fiercely with his strong hands and poured his life into her, she cried out and fastened herself onto him with her teeth and legs and fingers.

  After awhile he kissed her softly and rolled aside. “It was good, wasn’t it?” he murmured with satisfaction. “Just like the old days.” He groped for her hand and pressed it tightly.

  “We shouldn’t have tried to talk,” she said, exhausted.

  “It wasn’t my idea to waste time in talking,” he grunted. “Fosca, tell me about the boy. What’s he like?”

  “He’s wonderful,” she said warmly, “handsome—so handsome!—and smart and funny and—! But I sound like a proud mother. Well, I am proud. He’s a fine little man, our Paolo.”

  There was a silence. She braced herself. “Paolo? I thought we had decided on Daniel?”

  “Yes, I know we did. But Alessandro chose Paolo.”

  Raf hitched himself up on his elbow and glowered down at her. “Alessandro chose!” he echoed angrily. “What in hell does Alessandro have to do with naming our son?”

  “He wanted a son,” she explained. “An heir. And so he adopted mine. Ours. He’s been a very good father, Raf. He’s really fond of the boy. He spends a lot of time with him, teaching him—”

  “Teaching him how to be a damned little snot like himself,” Raf snarled. “Damn him. Adopted my son! You mean he told everyone that he had fathered the child. And you—you let him do it!”

  Fosca sat up and said, “Yes, I let him. He didn’t give me a choice. It was either go along with the lie, or never see my son again. But do you know what? I’m glad he did it. At least the boy has a name!”

  “He could have had my name!” Raf said angrily.

  “Oh, yes, your name! And he could have had your fortune as well, I suppose, and your protection, and your care!”

  “You know damned well that I couldn’t have given him any of those things. I was lucky to get out of Venice with my life. But he’s my son! Not Loredan’s!”

  Fosca said tightly, “Any man can plant the seed of a child in a woman’s belly. It doesn’t take any special talent to do that.”

  “You were always very appreciative of those talents, as I recall,” Raf said with a hint of a sneer. “You still are.”

  “What of it? I’m not ashamed of that. I’m just saying that you weren’t here and Alessandro was, and for whatever reasons he had then, he took the boy in and provided for him and loved him, as much as any man could.”

  Raf said quietly, “I want to see the boy.”

  Her first impulse was to refuse him. But how could she? She loved him. And he was Paolo’s father, after all.

  “I don’t think—”

  “He’s my son. Not Loredan’s. Mine!” he said doggedly. She sighed. She knew how obstinate he could be. He said again, “I want to see him.”

  She sat up, lifting her legs over the side of the bed, turning her back on him. “Loredan is away,” she said. “I will let you see Paolo. On one condition. That you don’t say anything to him about who you are. It would only confuse and upset him.”

  “He has a right to know!”

  “My God, Raf, he’s only six years old!” she cried. “He loves Alessandro. Can’t you understand that? I won’t have you coming at him, telling him you’re his father. You haven’t done any fathering, and Alessandro has. I’ll let you see him, because it would be wrong of me to refuse. But I have to think of the child, too. Promise me, Raf,” she turned and stroked his cheek lightly with her fingertip. “Please, Raf, do as I ask?” His mouth was set in a stubborn expression that she recognized. She knew she could never talk him around, so she leaned over and kissed him softly.

  “Please?” she said again in a whisper. “I’m his mother, after all. I only want to do what’s best for everyone. Please, Raf, don’t make it more difficult for me.”

  She could feel him relenting. He put his arm around her waist and pulled her closer, and rested his head against her breasts. She smoothed his hair and kissed his forehead.

  “Tomorrow,” he said. “I want to see my son tomorrow.”

  “All right,” she sighed. “Tomorrow. I’ll take him out in the morning, to the latteria near Florian’s. You know the place. But you’ll have to be careful about what you say in front of him. I won’t tell him your name. He’s very sharp, and he would tell Alessandro or someone else all about you. We will pretend to meet casually. Perhaps you should be masked.”

  Raf uttered an extremely vulgar word. Then he dragged her down under him and covered her body with his own.

  Alessandro faced his adversary across the dinner table. It had taken all his self-control to keep his temper and to offer the appeasing platitudes that the Senate had instructed him to give. They were received with the utmost scorn, and he knew from the outset that there was nothing that he or anyone else could do to dissuade Napoleon Bonaparte from taking Venice tomorrow, if he so desired.

  “Ah, yes, the Doge,” the little general said, sipping his champagne. “I have heard a little about this Doge of yours. A senile old man, is he not?” He was, but Alessandro refrained from agreeing. ‘A strange choice for a leader,” Napoleon observed, “but perhaps a not inappropriate one. A senile leader for a senile republic.” He laughed at his joke. “And the Inquisitors! I hear they are toothless old men, nearly blind and deaf, and that the citizens of Venice tremble when they are mentioned.”

  “Only when they have something to fear from them,” Alessandro said smoothly. “Only the guilty need be afraid.”

  “Indeed? But all men are guilty of something, are they not? Therefore all Venetians are afraid.”

  “Fear is an effective means to control the populace,” Alessandro shrugged.

  “Foolishness!” the Corsican snorted. “It takes an army to inspire fear in real men. Frenchmen would never be daunted by three toothless old men! But tell me,” he leaned forward, his black eyes shining, “they say that the Doge weds the sea every year. Is that true? What an extraordinary spectacle that must be! Does he enter her fully clothed or naked? Or perhaps he spills his seed into a vessel and tosses that to the waves? Does this union ever produce children? Are they fish—or little old men?”

  His officers were sniggering. Alessandro kept a cool smile fixed on his face and said nothing.

  “They say that a man can sire children even into his nineties,” Napoleon went on. “I really think that it would be a kindness to inform the Doge that, if that is his intention, he should choose a less temperamental lover, and a less dangerous one.”

  Another member of the Venetian delegation tried to explain that the wedding of Venice to the Adriatic was just a symbolic ceremony in which the Doge tossed a golden ring into t
he waves, but Napoleon interjected insulting and sarcastic remarks at every turn and made the explanation seem more farcical than the actual event.

  “They say,” Napoleon said sneeringly, “that the noblemen of Venice are so stupid that they can’t remember who they are, and that is why they have their names entered into a special Golden Book at birth.”

  “Perhaps,” a French aide suggested, “it is to verify their parentage as well?” The French laughed heartily, while the Venetians maintained a strained silence, and Bonaparte observed that a name entered in a book was proof of nothing.

  Napoleon then launched into a mocking appraisal of the Venetian form of government, from the Council and the Senate to the Council of Ten and the Inquisitors. Alessandro didn’t bother to inform him that the system had worked brilliantly in the past, and that it was organized to prevent just the sort of internecine rivalries that had plagued and tom the French Revolutionary governments apart. Power was not invested in a single man or group. Venice had experienced a remarkable history of internal peace, while all around her states were falling prey to the ambitions of single men or parties. Alessandro did not voice his opinion that if France were Venice, no Napoleon Bonaparte would have been possible.

  Finally the meal ended and the general dismissed his guests rudely and returned to work. The Venetian delegation found its way back to its lodgings, a reputable inn in Verona.

  “How dare he?” one of the younger men fumed when they were gathered in Loredan’s room. “How dare he attack us like that? The impudence of the man!”

  “I’d be impudent, too, if I had an army of eighty thousand men at my back,” Alessandro said calmly. “I’m rather afraid that we failed to impress him with the inadvisability of attacking us.”

  “To have to sit there while he humiliated us!” another seethed. “It was outrageous! We should have stopped him!”

  “How?” Alessandro asked. “Believe me, I dearly wanted to turn him over my knee and spank him. But our instructions were not to antagonize him. We were to sound him out, assure him of our peaceful intentions, affirm our neutrality, but not to anger or provoke him.”

  “Filthy little commoner.”

  “He’s not even a gentleman! A Corsican!”

  “He is a soldier. A brilliant tactician and a brave and charismatic leader,” Alessandro said. “He’s got the finest army in Europe eating out of his hand. He can have anything he wants—the entire continent!”

  “But what can we do? What shall we tell the Senate, that we sat still and let him insult us?”

  “We will tell them the truth: that he was unreceptive to our overtures and that we should prepare to defend ourselves. We have done our best.”

  Lia let herself into her house on the Canal Regio. She had performed that night at a reception for the Swiss ambassador, then dined with her dear friends, Gaetano Vestris and his wife. It was late.

  The house felt cold. It was the end of October and the nights were beginning to feel cool. She went into the drawing room to see if her servant had left a fire burning, but the fireplace was cold.

  A voice came out of the darkness. “Where have you been?”

  She jumped and turned quickly. Raf sat in a deep chair in a dark corner.

  “Oh, it’s you! You might have given me some warning instead of trying to scare me out of my skin. I suppose you came to see Aunt Rebecca. How is she tonight?” She lit a candle, and another.

  “No better. Fat lot you care, running around half the night. I sent the woman away. I asked you where you’d been.”

  She took a stance in front of him. You don’t need to act the part of the jealous lover because I know you don’t mean a word of it. You know very well that I had to dance tonight, for the Doge and his guests. Not that you care, but I was brilliant. The old man himself gave me a little bracelet.” She dropped the bangle into his lap.

  He ignored it. “Why didn’t you tell me that you and Loredan were lovers?”

  She frowned. “Because it’s over, and has been for months. Not that it’s any of your business.”

  “Loredan is my business! What he does, who he sees. What are you trying to do, make a fool of me?” He heaved himself out of his chair and stood in front of her. She could smell sour wine on his breath. “You know how I feel about him. Have you lost your mind, taking up with that Jew-hater? What about Aunt Rebecca? What if he finds out about her? Do you want her to die in prison?”

  “He knows all about her, and he has given us his protection,” Lia informed him. “I know very well how much you hate him. But that has nothing to do with me. He was kind to us.”

  “Kind! You mean he paid well for your services!”

  “Yes,” she said coldly, “he paid very well. And why shouldn’t he? I’m worth it. I have to look after myself, Raf. No one is going to do it for me. I won’t marry. What kind of man would want to marry a dancer? I liked him. I more than liked him!” She looked at him shrewdly. “Ah, I know why you’re angry. It’s because of her. What’s the matter, Raf, didn’t she throw herself into your arms? Wasn’t she glad to see you?”

  “Be quiet,” he growled.

  She shrugged and crouched down in front of the hearth to lay a fire.

  “He’s the only man in Venice who could muster enough support to give us any trouble,” Raf said. “He’s popular with the Arsenal workers and with the military. The people like him. He could be planning some resistance.”

  “If you’re asking me to worm any secrets out of Alessandro Loredan, don’t bother,” Lia said mildly. “He wouldn’t tell me anything, even if I could get him to sleep with me again. Ask his wife. He’s pouring his most intimate secrets into her ears now.”

  “That’s not true. She hates him!”

  “You’d like to believe that, wouldn’t you?” She looked at him pityingly. “If she hates him so much, why did she move heaven and earth to get him away from me? Why did she spend every night at his casino long after he had thrown me out and her job was finished? If you ask me, he’s made her fall in love with him. He’s capable of it. I know. I was half in love with him myself.”

  “You’re trying to make me angry.”

  “Why would I bother? You’re already angry. No, it’s the truth. You can’t see it, but he’s a very attractive man. Very attractive. Ask Donna Fosca. She’s found that out by now. What a joke!” Lia laughed shrilly and humourlessly. “She’s betraying her lover with the husband they cuckolded together!”

  Raf leaped at her and shook her. “Stop it. I’m going to break him, I swear! I’m going to bring him down, destroy him! I’ve hated him all my life.”

  “If you hate him so much, why are you trying to be like him?” Lia demanded. “You want his power and his money, and his woman. All this talk about revolution is just an excuse, so that you can get rid of him and take what he has for yourself. In a few years you’ll be as corrupt and evil as any noble!”

  He hit her, a stinging slap on the cheek. She pressed her hand to the spot.

  “Get out of my house, Raf,” she said with deadly calm. “You are not welcome here any more.” She walked quickly out of the room.

  He stood in front of the smoldering fire and brought his fists down on the mantelpiece with a crash.

  “Damn him!” he muttered. “Damn Loredan!”

  Fosca and Paolo spent the morning inspecting a rhinocerous that had recently been brought from Africa. The animal created a sensation in Venice, and conversations that Fall concerned not the threat of French invasion, but the miraculously hideous creature with the single horn.

  Paolo was delighted by the rhinocerous and wanted to ride him. Fosca dissuaded him with difficulty. When it was time to meet Raf at the latteria or dairy shop, she asked Paolo if he would like some whipped cream for a treat. The choice between further observation of the beast and whipped cream was a difficult one, but Paolo’s insatiable appetite won the day.

  Raf was already there, looking hulking and out of place in the small sweet shop. Fosca noticed
that he wasn’t masked, and she felt frightened. She led Paolo to a table near Raf’s, and after giving their order to the waiter pretended to notice him for the first time.

  “Ah, Signor Busoni!” she chirped. “Please join us. I don’t think you have met my son, Paolo.”

  Raf came over to their table. Paolo, beautifully trained, jumped out of his seat and made a courtly bow. Raf returned it mockingly, at least to Fosca’s eyes, and they both sat down again. He and Paolo stared at each other curiously for a moment, then Paolo said. “We’ve been to see the rhinocerous, Signor! It was wonderful! He’s very large. Papa says they don’t have horns when they’re born, but that they grow them, like beards, when they are older.”

  “Don’t chatter so, Paolo,” Fosca said in a motherly tone that didn’t conceal her pride in her son.

  “It’s all right,” Raf said. “I’m very interested in what Paolo is saying. I suppose your Papa has been to Africa and seen these rhinocerous babies, Paolo?”

  “I don’t think he has, but we decided that it was a logical thing to believe. Baby goats don’t have their horns when they’re born, either.”

  “That’s true,” Raf admitted. He looked uncomfortable. Their order came. Fosca sipped her coffee and Paolo attacked his treat with gusto. “I suppose your Papa knows a lot of things?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Paolo enthusiastically. “I think he knows more than Monsieur Diderot’s whole Encyclopedia!”

  “Really. Have you read it?”

  “Some of it. Mostly I just look at the pictures and Papa explains what they are. I can’t read French very well yet. One picture showed a man having his head drilled open,” he said with relish, spooning a glob of cream into his mouth, “and another one having a stone taken out of his stomach! Did you know that they have a curved knife that can cut your scalp open in one slice—”